Even greater support for young entrepreneurs: ISPO cooperates with Bits & Pretzels

This year, for the first time ever, ISPO is the official partner of the Bits & Pretzels founding conference scheduled to be held at the Munich exhibition grounds from September 25 to 27. Thus ISPO, as international business platform, expands its commitment for young entrepreneurs and start-ups.

More than 5,000 founders, investors and media representatives from all over Europe will meet at the ICM—Internationales Congress Center München from Sunday, September 25 to Tuesday, September 27, 2016. At
Bits & Pretzels, the international founding conference, they will exchange views and information on new trends and innovations in the area of digital technology—this year for the first time ever in collaboration with ISPO.

For ISPO, the support of start-ups and founders has already become a tradition: since the year 2000, an independent jury elects the most promising newcomers of the sports industry on an annual basis within the framework of ISPO BRANDNEW. Former prize winners, including GoPro, Naish Kites, Maloja, Nixon or On are shaping today's market. ISPO BRANDNEW is the biggest young entrepreneur competition of the sports industry.

Accumulated ISPO competence at Bits & Pretzels

Klaus Dittrich, Chairman and CEO of Messe München, will support the event as
Table Captain in the Schottenhammel tent on September 27.

Tobias Gröber, Head of ISPO Group, will also dedicate himself to promote the founding event. He will give a lecture in the “Hot Lifestyle” category.

In this category, which is curated by ISPO, everything revolves around the influence of digitization on the sports and fitness industry and around trends in tourism.

This year, Markus Hefter, Exhibition Director of ISPO MUNICH and jury member at ISPO BRANDNEW, will contribute his expertise to the Bits & Pretzels founding conference and participate in the selection of the best start-ups there.

Specifically for Bits & Pretzels, the deadline for the submission of applications to
ISPO BRANDNEW has been extended by one week to Tuesday, October 4, 2016. Thus, the participants of the founding conference can still take part in the competition at short notice.

More about Bits & Pretzels

During the three-day founding event at the ICM—Internationales Kongress Center München, the digital scene will exchange views and information on new trends in the course of lectures and discussions. Start-ups can present their business ideas on the first two days. The most innovative ones will be selected by a jury and will then compete against each other in the final. The winner will, among other things, be invited to a start-up meeting to the Californian Silicon Valley, the most significant location of the IT industry worldwide. The participants will spend the third day together at the Oktoberfest, the Munich beer festival.

The most prominent speakers of this year's event are the two-time Oscar winner and start-up investor Kevin Spacey (“House of Cards”) and the founder of Virgin Records, the Englishman Sir Richard Branson, to mention but a few. In addition, numerous successful Internet entrepreneurs, such as Nathan Blecharczyk (airbnb), Florian Gschwandtner (Runtastic) and Daniel Graf (Uber), have confirmed their participation.